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Sunday, 30 April 2017

I have never been the biggest fan of flying. However I knew unless i wanted to add an unnessicary amount of extra time to my trip i would have to get over that in order to fly to Japan.

I woke up a little before my alarm which gave me those extra few minutes to snuggle to kitties. They didn't appreciate the extra love but hopefully it makes up for the three week I won't be able to hug them.

Then after a nice cup of tea we were off and i was waiting for my flight.
I was surprised how my anxiety really didn't come out. Perhaps because i wanted to be strong in front of my friends or maybe i'm just getting better at dealing with flying. Either way everything was great.

Until we were up in the air... we hit some pretty hard tourbulance... enough where the Captain even came on the intercom and tried to remind us that this was nothing and we were all just nervous for no reason. (Tell that to my achy everything).

Luckily that flight did have wifi so i was able to rewatch some Natsume Yuujinchou (because crunchyroll doesn't really work in japan and the show airs surprisingly late) and chat with friends on the ground.

However the flight to BC wasn't too long and eventually we were rushing across YVR to get to our connecting flight.

Currently i have only flown a handful of times and only ever within canada so seeing the size of the airbus that would be taking us across the water was pretty impressive.
However no wifi and much tighter chairs.
This flight was a little over 9 hours which is a time to be forced to sit. But at least there was no tourbulance... i'll take the small victories when they come.

I did get to watch Moana on the plane (which i really enjoyed even if i wish disney would stop trying so hard to have key jingle scenes [pretty much everything with that damn rooster])

After we landed that's when things got a bit more complex.
Everyone except me had to get a sim card (i'm lazy and just doing my providers roam like home thing cause even though it's more expensive it's so much less hassle)
Then we had to get our JR rail passes and that line was surprisingly long, still worth it in the end.
After that we grabbed a quick bite to eat an did our best to stay up as late as possible because 13 hour time difference is a bit brutal.

Unfortunately i didn't take any pictures because i was just too brain dead and tired but started tomorrow that should change.

The plans for tomorrow are!
Ghibli Museum!
FFXIV cafe
The rest is up in the air but there are probably some small things we can do through the day.
And yeah more pictures next time i promise!

Side note: a lot of appliances in this country talk to you.... i dunno it makes me chuckle

Tuesday, 25 April 2017

It;s that time of year again and OH boy i already know i'm going to have a lot of my plate...
so without further ado.

Ground rules

1. I will TRY to give every show on Crunchyroll and Daisuki a chance but that doesn't mean i am obligated to watch a full episode. If i stop early i will give a time stamp and reason for stopping.

2. No shows that are under 20 minutes in length, i don't like waiting a whole week for a 3 min gag. there are some exceptions but it's rare.

3. No shows with Brother, Sister, Father or Mother in the title... too often it goes into incest... which i really do not like.

4. If the show is a second season of a show i didn't watch before I'm not going to talk about it here.

5. No card game shows, i may give them a chance but they really aren't my thing.

6. All opinions are my own and based solely on what i have seen. I tend to go into these shows completely blind. If i don't enjoy the show after 1 episode or even quit out of an episode early I'm not saying the show is bad... just that i didn't enjoy it.

Returning shows.

My Hero Academia Season 2

Yay this show is back for another wonderful spring season. Much like last year i went in apprehensive and ended up really enjoying this... i am scared it'll pull out more shonen tropes this season but you know what? still excited.
After watching the episode.... yeah ok i'm worried about what is essentially a tournament arc (I cannot describe how much i hate them) but hey... maybe it'll be good... going to hold out hope.

The Eccentric Family Season 2

This is one of those shows i keep forgetting how much i love it... but it's so good. Slice of life show set in Kyoto focusing on the blance between land dwelling humans, Tengu that soar the heavens and shape shifting Tanuki. This show never fails to warm my heart and i am so happy we are getting more of it.

Natsume Yuujinchou Roku

HA HA HA... So... i'm going to japan soon and i'm not kidding when i say i'm going to 4 different events for this one damn show (they just happened to be when I am planning to go... i didn't plan the trip around them..... but yeah i love this damn show)
So yeah lets just say Number 1 anime 2017 since i am 100% confident in that statement and i look forward to having my heart ripped out if a certain chapter gets animated.
Also please animate the shibata chapter, the special chapters with the friends and everything concerning [insert the only possible spoiler this should could have]
True story: after about 2 seconds of the intro song i cried cause it's just... so pretty
Also true story: i already have the intro, end and BGM cds on order.... cause i really love this show.
More true stories: So i've been playing Persona 5.... and you get to name your group.... yeah i called them Yuujinchou
SO yeah..... I LOVE THIS SHOW.... you know... incase that wasn't clear.

Attack on Titan Season 2

You know what? I'm not going to watch this one just yet... Back when the original season aired it didn't interest me at all (plus i think it was overhyped and fanbases can scare me away from certain shows) however when i did eventually give a a try i ended up marathoning it. So thats what i'm going to do here. I will assume it's good, let this cour play out (i assume like last time it's multiple cours) and then in 13 weeks i'll just watch it all in one go.

Granblue Fantasy

Uh... not really returning cause it was just a preview last season... but yeah same opinion as last time... it seems interesting enough to give a chance. probably wont watch any of it till i get back from my trip though.

New Shows

Alice & Zuroku

44 min episode.... well lets see if this show is for me~
Hm i'm conflicted.
I think this has the potential to be very interesting. The premise is about a group of children who have supernatural powers being kept in a lab when one "the red queen" escapes.
She end up in the company of a old man who has no time to deal with this Magical girl bullshit.
however i'm worried that it'll just be a silly slice of life show with a fish out of water premise instead of actually going into details about anything... however i am going to give it another episode at least... but there is already a lot this season that i am excited for.

The Laughing Salesman

If it sounds too good to be true.... it is.
Don't try to find loopholes in the thing that is too good to be true.... it'll just make things worse
not saying it's a bad concept for a episodic show but i think a full cour of this would be insufferable. So i'm going to pass.

The Silver Guardian

13 mins shows probably shouldn't have full length intros... i mean you wasting so much time on what is already a short show.
also if i wanna experience a new world opening up at midnight i'll play persona 3

Sakura Quest

This show is super cute, a young girl has a memory of being a queen and yet in her every day life she can't even get a single job being turned down from 30 places.
However one day she gets a call from a modelling agency she did a shoot for once just to find out a tourism board has asked for her by name to be their Queen.
What seems like a simple job turns into a huge misunderstanding and her dream of working in tokyo slowly seems to fade away.
I enjoyed this one... sometimes PA works shows are a bit of a miss for me but i have high hopes for this one (plus a show about the charms of living in a smaller city? right up my alley)

KADO: The Right Answer

I think the lesson from this is that you probably shouldn't do an episode 0.... at least not at the start of a show.
The entire time i was asking "why the hell am i supposed to give a shit about any of this"
then in the last minute or so it's like "oh by the way we do have a plot but since this was episode 0 we just wanted to set up the characters!"
guess what... you can establish character without making me sit through an 18 minute thing about a metal comapny that i know nothing about being saved by a negotiator.
I get it the dude is smart and able to see the bigger pitched but there are better ways of illustraiting that.
Probably not giving it it's actual episode 1 but cause frankly the plot they do intorduce looks dull.

Tsukigakirei

There is something..... familiar about how this is animated.... or moreso the style in which it's coloured. Normally i'm not a big fan of the harsh blownout white highlights on edges but in this.... it;s just making me thinking of something else and i can't put my finger on it.
Maybe it looks like Grimgar of fantasy and ash? Though i'm not seeing any connection to it...
um.... It's a slice of life show that feels like an ad for LINE (a messaging thing on phone popular in japan)
It feels really really slow and a bit unnatural? Like i'm shy as hell but i don't tend to have my coping mechanism so overtly out there? and him.. he just feels kinda dull right now. i do think it's funny that the guy with the most interesting hair isn't the main character.
but yeah not bad but not enough of a pull to get me to watch more.

Akashic Records of Bastard Magical Instructor

Well that certainly is a title.... i guess.
why do the girls have to wear half shirts with suspenders holding up the micro mini skirks as well as separate suspenders to hold up their thigh highs but the end get like... an actual outfit.
Like i get it this show is going to be a harem show or a fanservice show but seriously? like... they could have tried with the school uniform.
oh great... sexually harassing girls who are friends... yeah i mean.... literally no one does this... and it's just so irritating to see it done over and over again. not to mention it's supposed to be funn ythat this teacher walks in on his female students chaning and refuses to turn away so he can burn the image into his mind? This show is just awful... maybe it'll get better later but 13 minutes in and i rather be watching anything else.
The teacher is an asshole, the students are annoying and it just isn't funny.

Clockwork Planet

"This may come as a surprised but the planet was destroyed so time ago"
And i'm out.. thanks for playing.

The Royal Tutor

The show is about a tutor who looks like a child learning more about the beautiful but damamged princes he's been instructed to tutor.
It's supposed to be a comedy but a lot of the jokes fall a bit flat for me personally. I don't think it's a bad show it's just no connecting with me at all... feels likes like it would be more at home as a visual novel or something.

WorldEnd: What do you do at the end of the world? Are you busy? Will you save us?

I'm not kidding that is the title...
well it has been a little while since i've had one of these stupid long titles... time to check it out.
Well long title aside... this first episode was really interesting and i look forward to more of this show.
Willem is the last Human (or at least last human male?) and he's been charged with guaring a military super weapon... though not everything is as it seems.
The art is a bit generic (reminds me of dating sim art that plagues early Aughts anime) and considering how old the character is he doesn't really look it ( i would have guessed Teen but considering facts that are revealed through the episode that simply isn't possible.
But the music is good, the animation is good... i fear it's going to get a bit harem-y but the overall plot seems like it may be worth it.

Love Rice

what?
so.... rice is less popular so they form boy bands to show how much they love rice...
well either way 4 min episode so pass.... but seriously wtf.

Love Tyrant

It's like death note but instead there's a kiss note... and if this dude doesn't kiss someone within 24 hours then the shinigami will die....
*gets to the character Akane* ok when you are in freeze frame but your breasts are still jiggling... yeah i'm out... if you don't mind a goofy show about kissing it's probably fine but between unlikable main character, perverted shinigami who would rather force two people who don't like each other to kiss and just harem tropes in general i know this isn't a show for me so pass.

Hinako Note

So..... much..... Moe.
uh... it's about.... uh.... girls i ntokyo who are utterly adorable and also strange... one eats books cause they are her friends.... another acts like a scarecrow cause..... uh..... why not?
I just... can't stomach how cutesy it is...

Twin Angels BREAK

Again... very cute, not quite as sickeningly cute as hinako note but still a bit too cutesy for me.
Magical girl show focusing on a girl from one of the more tropical islands transferring to tokyo for school.
Again doesn't seem bad but i can't get into it.

Eromanga Sensei

.... don't... really wanna.
like the title of the episode is "my little sister, and the sealed room"
.... can i just... throw this in the "no sister in the title" rule..
ugh... fine lets see... maybe it's better then it appears?
Ok.... halfway thorugh and maybe i was judgeing a book by it's cover too hard**
the concept is cute, a middleschooler ends up being an author and is paired up with an illustraitor no one has ever met (Eromanga Sensei) well apparently it's someone closer to hims then he thought.
however.... this show has clearning establshed that the 'sister' character is just a step sister... and pretty sure it's going to go down the incest route pretty damn quick.
I don't give a shit they aren't related... do not care... still gross.
I did however laugh when the artist look a picture of themselves posing to get to composition right cause yeah... sometimes you gotta do that.
Yeah.... uh... called it.
Like maybe they won't go the romance route but it's really disturbing to see bro and sis constantly blush at each other.
The show may be fine but with that possibility there i wont be watching.

Tsugumomo

the first interation with this caharcter is woken fro a dream and accidental boob grab....
I thought this shit was played out in the 90s...
it just looks like a gag anime and i don't have time atm.

And that looks like it! all the rest are sequels or short shows.... yay
Normally i'd feel like this season is lacking but between Natsume yuujinchou 6 and Eccentric Family 2 i think we are good
Also my hero acedemia 2 even thought it's a tournament art.... Sakura quest seems to be a nice surprise at least.
However all of this gets put on hold for a few weeks cause i am heading to Japan! see you at the end of the month~ (i'll have lots of pictures on twitter so feel free to follow @Raichana)

Tuesday, 18 April 2017

Story time: When i was younger I played the shit out of this game. I was like 7 or 8 and I loved it.
Right up until my brother accidentally broke the CD... i was so upset but what could you do.

Fast forward to today and i get to play the remastered version.

Is it as fun as I remember? hell how much do I remember?

That was what I wanted to find out.

So I bought the game in hopes of answered all my questions.

First off: I remembered far more then I expected. In fact I remembered every 'Puzzle' except one near the end. I got to laugh and get some jokes that went over 7 year old me's head. The remastered art look great and it's almost ashamed that it couldn't have looked this clean the first time around. The addition of Audio Commentary is awesome and while I haven't looked too hard into it I have loved what I saw

Second the controls of the walking around bits are pretty good. you can grab, look at, kick or lick/talk lots of things. Ben's dialogue is very witty and there are a ton of jokes that got a giggle out of me. the voice acting is fantastic, just as good as i remember.

However..... the bit where you have to fight other bikers.
Holy shit i do not remember that being so....... frustrating.
I knew the solution to getting the thing you need... i remembered it.
but no matter how hard i tried... NOPE... couldn't actually hit the guy with the correct thing. (luckily there is an insta win thing that i found out when i was getting so frustrated that i thought something was missing [it wasn't i just suck at the combat])

The game did crash once (right after i got the weapon i needed so that was fun)

but other then that ran super well and I seriously enjoyed every minute.

It took me about 4 hours to replay the game..... My bro who loved the game as much as me beat it in about 2 and a half.... i guess his memory is better then mine.

it's a great game and if you don't mind the length i would give it a try. Best point and click ever? no... not even close. but still an interesting game with a quick story.
Would love to get more but it's alright that it'll probably never happen... just glad i got to replay this gem.

You can get it on PS4, PSVita, GoG or Steam and right now it's on sale for 20% off. If you like Lucas arts point and click games then give it a try!

Saturday, 8 April 2017

So I think we can all agree that Makoto Shinkai has an amazing story as a creator.
From Voices of a distant star... a film he did almost entirely on his own... to this, one of the highest grossing animated films in Japan.

I will say flat out, this is probably my fav Makoto Shinkai film... even though I had a panic attack in the theater.

So uh... Full disclosure I'm not going to spoil anything (it's a film that is best gone into 100% blind) but at the same time if you know this particular fear I have and happen to share it... then yeah be warned.... it's explored in great detail... and I found it too much for me personally (even though i was handling it really well right up until a certain point.... what can you do)

The animation is stunning, the music is fitting and the plot is really well done (one of the best 'that' kind of story i have ever seen) and it has a great balance of emotion moving from making you laugh one second to crying to laughing and yeah i enjoyed almost every moment.

It's fairly disappointing that this isn't getting a full theatrical release but on the other hand i'm glad we got the subbed version since some of the jokes wouldn't make sense in english. (though I curious to see how they try)

If you have the chance to see it please take it, it's worth the time, i'm hoping Crunchyroll adds it to the occasional makoto shinkai weekends they do... and even though i can't watch that one scene i will probably buy the movie eventually.... just you know... the skip button exists when i'm at home. (i think being trapped in the movie theater didn't help with that particular scene)

But yeah the rest of the movie was just so great and I can't praise it enough.

About Me

I am an artist who enjoys reading and playing games, I probably spend too much time on the computer and i like to share my opinion on things i finish. If you have any suggestions of things i should read/watch or play please feel free to let me know.